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How religion has become the new battleground in the fight against Obama’s health-care reform

Should your boss’s religion factor in your access to contraception? The issue is now will reside with the Supreme Court, which agreed Tuesday to consider the religious liberty of private companies versus birth control.

"Obamacare" supporter Margot Smith, left, pleads her case with legislation opponents as they rally on the sidewalk during legal arguments over the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act at the Supreme Court in Washington in March 2012. (JONATHAN ERNST / REUTERS file photo)

The question itself is alien to Canada, where employers have little to no say in the doctor-patient relationship.

But for Americans, the issue is now will reside with the Supreme Court, which agreed Tuesday to consider the religious liberty of private companies versus birth control as part of a new legal challenge to President Barack Obama’s troubled heath-care reform.

The U.S. high court is expected hear arguments late this winter, with no decision likely before June 2014. But the development only adds to the grievous and glitch-marred rollout of so-called Obamacare, returning the president’s signature legislation to the heart of America’s culture wars.

At issue is a challenge from scores of U.S. private companies like Pennsylvania-based Conestoga Wood Specialties, which argues the Affordable Care Act forces the Mennonite-owned family firm to “live contrary to its Christian convictions” by mandating all employees receive insurance coverage for birth control and other reproductive health services.

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The question has already bounced through lower U.S. courts, with mixed results. The Hahn family, which owns Conestoga, appealed to the Supreme Court after losing a 2-1 decision at the U.S. Court of Appeals 3rd circuit, arguing that the heavy financial penalties for ignoring the law could put the company itself at risk.

“If government can put Americans out of business for keeping their faith, there is no limit to what freedoms it can take away,” the Hahn’s senior legal counsel, Matt Bowman, said in a statement.

Other employers such as the Christian-owned Hobby Lobby Inc., a nationwide chain of some 500 arts and crafts stores, argue that the law facilitates access to abortion by forcing companies to provide access to drugs that prevent human embryos from being implanted in a woman’s uterus.

The White House on Tuesday downplayed the challenges, saying the law’s requirement on contraceptives is “lawful and essential to women’s health.” The administration is “confident the Supreme Court will agree,” it said.

The divisive question of religious liberty has arisen before, with the Obama administration carving out exemptions for certain nonprofits and religiously affiliated organizations. In most of those cases, workarounds were negotiated to enable female employees to receive contraceptive coverage elsewhere at no cost.

But no such exemption was offered to private companies whose owners object to the law on religious grounds and that is now what the high court will weigh — whether the U.S. guarantee of religious freedom applies strictly to individuals, or extends also to private companies. And, if the court decides the latter, the related question of whose freedom matters most.

A modest majority — 53 per cent — of Americans appear to favour the contraceptive mandate for private companies, according to one survey conducted in 2012 by the Public Religion Research Institute. By comparison, 43 per cent said such companies should not be forced to offer such coverage, the Washington Post reported.

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